Understanding The Kate Steinle Verdict

By Tom Knighton

By now, I suspect most of you are familiar with the Kate Steinle verdict. For those unfamiliar, Kate Steinle was a woman who was shot and killed, reportedly by an illegal immigrant who had been deported back to Mexico several times but was now lounging and relaxing in San Francisco thanks to that city’s sanctuary city status.

The illegal, a man named Jose Ines Garcia Zarate, was found not guilty last week in the murder of Kate Steinle.

After 12 days of testimony, two days of closing arguments and roughly 28 hours of deliberations, a jury of six men and six women acquitted defendant Jose Ines Garcia Zarate of first- and second-degree murder and involuntary manslaughter, as well as assault with a semi-automatic weapon, in the fatal shooting of Kate Steinle.

Garcia Zarate was found guilty of illegal firearms possession, which carries a sentence of 16 months to three years.

“Today is vindication for the rights of immigrants,” defense attorney Francisco Ugarte said. “Nothing about (Garcia Zarate’s) ethnicity or immigration status was relevant in this case.”

Garcia Zarate, who had been deported five times and was awaiting deportation for a sixth time, was released by the San Francisco Sheriff’s Department weeks before …Read the Rest

Source:: Bearing Arms